Chapter 12
“I just have to stop by the shop for a minute,” I tell Gus later that afternoon after I pick him up from school. “I have to grab some papers from the office.”
“Okay.” He trails me into the store reluctantly. “But then can we go home and keep building the LEGO spaceship?”
I ruffle his hair. “Absolutely. Just give me a minute.”
The storefront is empty, but I hear noise from the bathroom.
Someone is playing Nirvana turned down low.
I poke my head in the open bathroom door, expecting Walt, and get an eyeful.
The bottom half of a long, lean, blue jean–clad male is sticking out from under the sink.
That’s a view I could get used to. I appreciate it for a half second before I clear my throat, not wanting to startle him.
This must be Walt’s helper. “Hello?” I call over the sound of Kurt Cobain’s raspy vocals.
The man stands up so abruptly he hits his head on the sink, utters a mild swear, and turns to me. When I glimpse his face, my stomach drops. It’s Jakob Kristensen. He’s wearing a T-shirt and blue jeans and holding a large metal wrench. He rubs his head and winces.
“You!” I blurt out, staring up at Jakob. He looks down on me with a vaguely amused expression. “What…what are you doing here?” I ask, feeling off-kilter.
“I’m fixing your leak.” He punches a button on his phone and the music goes silent.
For some reason, the whole scene is disconcerting.
I’m pretty sure I’ve had spicy dreams about this exact scenario, although Jakob has never been the romantic lead.
I blush bright red thinking of how I just ogled his backside in those snug jeans.
I notice Jakob’s shirt, a tight, faded blue tee with our high school mascot, a heavily bearded and mustachioed Viking wearing a purple helmet with horns on it. That shirt takes me back a few years.
Gus is peering around me, staring at Jakob with wide eyes. “Who are you?” he asks cautiously, looking at Jakob like he’s trying to determine if this stranger is the coolest guy he’s ever seen or one of the tricky people who lure children into vans, the ones I’m always warning him about.
“I’m Jakob.” Jakob squats so he’s at eye level with Gus. “Who are you?”
“Gus.”
“Nice to meet you, Gus.” Jakob sticks out his hand. Gus looks at it in surprise, considers for a moment, then shakes it hesitantly.
“You need to put a quarter in the swear-word jar,” he informs Jakob.
Jakob’s mouth twitches upward, and he pulls out a battered wallet and hands Gus a dollar. “Consider this a prepayment for my next three citations,” he says.
Gus narrows his eyes and thinks for a moment, then nods and pockets the dollar. He seems to have decided that Jakob is okay, because he leans in a little and asks confidentially, “Did you know there are more stars in the universe than grains of sand on all the beaches on earth?”
Oh boy. We’ve gone straight to weird space facts. Curious, I watch to see how Jakob handles it.
Without skipping a beat, Jakob nods solemnly. “Actually, I did know that. Pretty wild, huh,” he says. He raises an eyebrow. “Did you know that humans are made up of elements that were formed inside stars and released into the universe when they died?”
Gus looks intrigued. “Really?”
“Really. Do you know what that means?” Jakob asks.
Slowly Gus shakes his head. Jakob leans closer. “That means you and I, all of us, are made of stardust.” He watches Gus digest this information.
Gus looks awestruck at the thought. “I’m really made of stars?” he asks, eyes wide. “Is that true?”
Jakob nods. “You, buddy, are a living part of a star. We all are. Cool, huh?”
Gus stares at Jakob, his mouth slightly open, as though he’s just received some sort of divine, esoteric secret.
“That’s so cool,” he breathes, clearly impressed.
I’m impressed too. Most adults chuckle at Gus’s science facts and think his obsession with space is kind of cute, but few actually engage with him on his level.
Jakob isn’t patronizing him, just meeting him where he is.
And how does he know such weird facts about space?
I guess it’s no surprise. Jakob was always like a lint roller for information, picking up trivia everywhere he went.
I look at him, the tattoos and muscles and little baby man bun, and wonder what has happened to him to turn him from the sweet, awkward boy I knew in high school to this sexy, space trivia–spouting ex-Marine.
I still see him in there, the Jakob who was my friend, but he’s so much more confident now.
I wonder what the years have held for him.
Gus is eyeing Jakob’s wrench and the broken plumbing under the sink with an interest usually reserved for outer space.
“What are you doing?” he asks.
“Fixing a leak so your mom can get your store open again,” Jakob tells him.
“Oh, cool,” Gus says. Then he turns to me. “Mom, can I have a snack?”
“Sure, honey. There are pretzels and a cheese stick and an apple that Grammy packed for you in the front pocket of your backpack. Do you want to go grab it from the car? Remember we parked right in front of the shop.”
“Sure!” Gus trots off toward the entrance, motivated by the promise of a snack. He gets hangry if he doesn’t have protein every few hours. Cheese sticks and those little cups of peanut butter often save us from a meltdown.
I’m aware that Jakob is watching our interaction with interest.
“How old is he?” Jakob asks.
“He was six in November,” I explain, watching Gus as he heads out the door. “He’s six going on sixty.”
“Smart kid,” Jakob says mildly. I sense he wants to ask more, but he doesn’t.
“He’s obsessed with space,” I tell him. “Be forewarned, he’ll pepper you with more odd facts about space than you even knew existed.”
“I’ll look forward to that,” Jakob says with a wry smile. He glances back at the sink. I should let him get back to work. Gus grabs his backpack and slams the car door shut.
“His father and I aren’t together,” I blurt out instead, not sure why I feel I need to explain. “His dad lives in Belgium now with his wife and baby.”
Jakob tilts his head and eyes me. Even though I’m wearing wedges, he still towers over me by a foot.
“Single parenting and running a business? That’s a lot to handle.
And your mom’s health isn’t great either, right?
” He’s looking at me intently with those arctic eyes and a little frown.
I feel like he’s peeling back the layers of competency and cheerfulness that I try to wear every waking moment, like he is catching a glimpse of the raw exhaustion and grinding worry lurking at the back of my mind all the time.
Uncomfortable under the scrutiny, I ask, “What are you doing under my sink?”
He chuckles. “Helping Walt. I’m done at the bakery by noon every day, so Walt hires me on projects if he needs another set of hands. Frankly, I like it a lot more than making bread.”
I sense there’s a story behind his comment about the bread, but I don’t ask. I’m too caught off guard by the fact that it seems like Jakob Kristensen is going to be around…a lot.
“I got my snack, Mom!” Gus comes in the front door, holding up his backpack. “I’m gonna eat it in the kitchen and read my space book, okay?”
“Sounds good, bud.” I give him a thumbs-up, then turn back to Jakob as Gus disappears down the hall.
When I told Walt he could hire someone, I had no idea he’d hire Jakob.
I don’t quite know how I feel about it. Jakob makes me self-conscious and flustered, but there’s no denying he’s fascinating too.
“You’re a man of many talents,” I observe.
“Where did you pick up plumbing skills?” The Jakob I knew was a nerd who was on the debate team and president of the robotics club but who suffered from two left feet and poor hand-eye coordination.
When he left town right after graduation to join the Marines, no one was more shocked than me.
“After I got out of the Marines, I bummed around for a while and ended up with a buddy of mine in Alaska. I did some commercial fishing and helped him build houses near Sitka for a few summers.” Jakob leans against the bathroom wall, arms crossed.
I try not to stare at his rounded biceps.
Shaping loaves of bread. Swinging a hammer.
Clearly he must have gotten better at the hand-eye coordination thing.
I swallow and look away, feeling a little out of my depth.
I can’t ignore the thing that sits between us, what happened the last time I saw him on graduation day.
It’s haunted me for years, the unanswered questions and the remorse.
I wonder if I should just address the elephant in the room. Maybe it’s time.
“Jakob, I…”
At that moment the bell over the front door jingles wildly.
“Yoo-hoo!” It’s Dani. “Emmie, where are you hiding, girl? I saw your car out front. Are you in here?”
“Coming!” I call out to her. “Sorry,” I tell Jakob. “One minute.”
I hurry out of the bathroom to find Dani standing in the middle of the shop. She’s not alone.
“Look who I found!” she exclaims, turning proudly to reveal none other than Henry Summers, who is standing behind her, looking around him at the waterlogged damage.
“Hello, Emmie,” Henry says, meeting my eyes and giving me a heartwarming, lopsided smile.
“I do hope I’m not intruding.” He looks adorable in a navy blue swazer and jeans with a simple gray T-shirt underneath.
His hair is falling over his forehead. He’s giving off very Hugh Grant in Notting Hill vibes. I love Notting Hill.
“Henry!” I’m surprised and delighted to see him, though I suddenly wish Dani had given me a little heads-up so I could brush the lunchtime grit from my teeth and smooth down my flyaways.
At least I’m wearing my sexy new bra. “Good to see you again.” I give Henry my brightest, warmest smile.
I wonder why he hasn’t called or texted. I wish I had a mint.